Chain of Command (12 page)

“I’d leave now,” she whispered to Pete, hoping he’d take the hint and bolt.

But, no. He took his sweet time. “Remember what I said.”

He stood there for another few seconds before he left. Stalked out of the store and slammed the door open with more force than he had before. It bounced against the outside wall as the bells flipped and clanged.

Kat watched it all without lessening the death grip on her phone. She looked around the room. “Thank you, everyone.”

There was a soft mumble of voices as people returned to their seats and conversation resumed.

Kat squeezed Hailey’s hand. “You okay?”

She was. Something about the last few minutes had made her fury burn off. There was something about people banding together that filled her with a humble gratitude.

And Kat kicked a little ass. Hailey
loved
that. “I was pretty impressed with you.”

She grabbed the coffeepot. “No one threatens my friends.”

Hailey toasted her with the coffee mug. “Damn straight.”

“Now if only I could get you to agree with me and give Sawyer a real chance.”

“Uh, see? You ruined the moment.” But she really didn’t. She just put words to what Hailey had been thinking about Sawyer, almost from the beginning—she needed to hear him out.

Chapter Twelve

He intended for them to get together and go out for something to eat. He really did. Sawyer had the thought all day and even now had Italian food on the brain as Hailey walked past him and into his family room. He’d opened the door to her five seconds ago and now he still stood there, looking into a sky painted pink and orange at sunset.

“Uh, Sawyer?” There was a strange vibration in her voice. “I’m over here.”

Half in a trance, he shut the door and turned around to face her. “Yes, you are. In my house.”

He’d called her four times since yesterday’s awkward morning show. Not awkward for him but, thanks to not hearing back from her, he sensed awkward for her. After thinking it through he begrudgingly admitted to himself that he could have handled the breakfast situation a whole lot better. He hadn’t meant to embarrass her but she needed to understand that he wasn’t a hide-in-the-closet type of guy.

And he would have fumbled his way through that explanation if she had answered her phone or his texts. He’d tried calling using his cell and home phone and nothing. Time marched on and paranoid explanations had filled his brain. He knew his devastating secret and the source of her greatest pain were tied. He knew and tried to bury the information in his head. He half wondered if she’d put the pieces together and figured it out.

But now she was here. Wearing a slim-fitting V-neck shirt and jeans that had his heartbeat taking off in a dash. Hair down, eyes clear and skin flushed. She looked half-ready for battle but he didn’t know what the war was about this time.

“You ignored me most of yesterday and all day today.” He wasn’t all that comfortable with how his voice bordered on whiny.

“True.” She leaned against the side of his couch with her hands folded in front of her. “I had some stuff I had to take care of.”

He guessed he would never get away with that excuse for not picking up the phone but decided not to raise the question. “Are you ticked off about something?”

Her eyes narrowed. “Like what?”

Looked like his rampant paranoia was just that. That left his “morning after” comment. “Yesterday morning.”

“No.” She didn’t snort but sounded ready to. “That was fine.”

Maybe he’d blown the whole situation up bigger in his head than was necessary. That didn’t sound like him and didn’t fit with how he operated with women, or anyone else. But this particular woman had him bobbing, weaving and ducking. He was too busy ignoring the thumping in his dick to exercise an ounce of common sense. Too busy worrying about the end to keep his head in the game now.

But when he focused, really focused, he noticed her cheeks turned a little pink. That raised his alarm. He talked about fucking because that’s how he liked it, but that didn’t mean she was comfortable thinking about it or doing it.

Talk about being out of his league. “Is it weird for you to have your friends know we had sex?”

“We didn’t.”

Oh
,
good
. They’d moved to the verbal gymnastics part of the conversation. He bit back a groan as he came down the step and stood in front of her. “True, we didn’t fuck. But we absolutely engaged in all kinds of sexual touching and a good bit of tasting, which was pretty fantastic, by the way.”

“I remember.”

He thought he saw her shiver but he couldn’t be sure if it was the good kind or not. “It felt like you were avoiding me since we—”

“Did everything but fuck?” Her fingers tightened where she held them together and her knuckles turned white.

“Not everything.” When her eyes widened he took a detour and made his point clear. “There are positions we could try. Toys. All sorts of things that will make you scream, but yeah.”

“I wouldn’t be here if I were upset or weirded out.” She eased her grip and the color returned to her fingers. “I wouldn’t have run a reverse lookup on your home phone number to track down your address.”

Now that sounded promising. So was that shirt and the way it dipped low enough to show him a peek of white shirt or bra or something underneath. “Wow.”

She made a hissing sound. “Too stalkerish?”

Not even close. “For the record, having a hot woman track me down is pretty fucking hot. You should feel free to hunt me down, strip me naked. Ride me, jump me. My body is yours.”

She blinked a few times. “That’s quite a comment.”

“I can list all the things I want you to do to me, if you like.” He’d start with his dick then move onto other body parts.

“This is going to seem like an odd transition, but I want you to tell me about the property and why you want it or think you’re entitled to it, or whatever. Let’s just spell it all out, once and for all.”

His brain came to a full stop. Here he was forgetting about dinner and thinking about feasting on her instead and she wanted to talk contracts. Talk about a misfire.

He walked further into the family room and with a gentle touch on her elbow brought her along. They stopped in the middle of all the furniture but they could have been in the middle of a cave for all he noticed. “I thought we were separating out business and personal.”

“We are.”

Could be this was a guy thing or the blood rushing to his dick made his brain completely useless, but he was not getting her point at all. “This doesn’t feel like we’re compartmentalizing very well. We just talked about fucking and now—”

“What I really want to do is strip off my shirt and figure out which one of these rooms is your bedroom.” She pointed behind him. “That’s what I’ve been thinking about all day.”

Yeah, not a drop of blood left in his brain. “I’m in. Let’s go.”

He reached for her but she stepped back. Just out of easy touching range and gnawed on her lower lip. “Wait.”

He officially gave up trying to follow the circles around her logic. “Clue me in here.”

She waved her hands in front of her. “Look, I know it feels like I’m sending mixed signals, but I really just want to talk business and then put it aside and focus on the other. And, yes, I know that’s what you originally suggested and I said no. Don’t mention that.”

His mind got stuck a few words back. “Focus on the other?”

“Us. Naked.”

“It’s kind of hard to ignore what you just said and concentrate on anything. Hell, I’d probably sign my car over to you if you showed me your bra.” Good thing he didn’t own the house because that would be hers, too.

Some of the tension left her face and amusement moved in. “I find it hard to believe you’re that easy.”

“I am a sure thing when it comes to you.” He was on permanent “go time” around her. It was downright embarrassing and from the way her mouth dropped open he guessed he’d delivered some unexpected news. “Very easy, and feel free to use me any way you want.”

She openly stared, all wide-eyed, before she shook her head. Even stuttered a bit before she got a sentence out. “The property. Do the abbreviated version. Like, facts only. Go.”

The revving inside him and tremor he saw moving through her hands made him double-time. “I knew Rob in Afghanistan.”

Sawyer stopped while the words still echoed in his head. She should be able to do the math and figure out he was there at the time Rob died. At least be curious enough to ask. Being smart, the pieces should click together her head and then the door would slam shut on them.

He waited as the tension pulled tight across his shoulders. His muscles actually ached.

She just stared at him. “And?”

The lack of a real response didn’t provide any relief. This could be a test. Or maybe he should just admit to all of it and let her walk away now, before they went one step further.

“Sawyer.” She took his hand in both of hers. “I really want to hear all of it.”

She didn’t, but he could tell her this part. “We talked in between assignments and during downtime. When the discussion turned to what came after the marines for me, I told him my dream of opening a gun range and self-protection business. A few days later he offered this land for the venture.”

“But he left the house and acres to me. Why would he do that if he wanted you to have it?” She sounded confused, not doubtful.

“He wasn’t going to just hand me the land. It was a business deal. The idea was for him to be a silent partner and me to buy a portion of the land over time through profits.”

Sawyer knew the explanation sounded ridiculous but he and Rob had shared this bond. They’d survived similar upbringings with difficult military fathers and no motherly influence. Men who demanded much and believed even one compliment softened their kids. The kind who hit the road and left their kids with friends of friends because that’s how low a priority the kids were compared to a lifetime in service.

“We sketched it out on a napkin one night.” The same one Rob carried with him until the day he died.

“Where is it?”

Covered in blood and ripped to shreds, the paper wouldn’t clear up anything now. Seeing it would destroy her, and there was no way Sawyer would put her in that position even though he kept what was left of it in a bag in the top drawer of his dresser. A piece of punishment he could relive every day.

He skipped all of that and lied. “We didn’t keep it.”

“And then Rob died.” Hailey winced as she said the words.

“Three weeks later.” And that’s where Sawyer had to stop before they waded into the pieces he couldn’t share. The explosion. Those awful hours after. He’d never felt helpless until that night when he sat there, boneless and numb, and tried to reason it through but never could.

“Were you there?” she asked.

The question slammed into his gut. It was his opening to spill it all. Let the guilt well up and the memories run. But he couldn’t get the words out. He looked at her expression, so hopeful and interested, and the truth burned through him.

He wasn’t ready for what they had to end. That would be fair but all he wanted was to be selfish.

She wanted to know if he was there, in the room or nearby, when the bomb went off. A simple question to her. A stabbing pain for him. But one he could answer honestly. “No.”

She swallowed as a shaky smile formed on her mouth. “Okay.”

He had no idea what that meant. “Okay?”

“So, it’s as straightforward as I thought. Exactly what you said way back in the bar only now I have more details. You need the land for your gun range. You thought it was yours and it isn’t and now you’re stuck, so you need me to agree. No hidden agenda.”

“Yes.” He grabbed onto the safer topic. “There are limited land options for this type of business. I need approvals and permits, and those aren’t a problem if the gun range is on a portion of your acreage.”

She nodded. “Hmm.”

“Any chance you could translate that into actual words?”

“No, that’s it for now. I asked and you answered. Now, which one is your bedroom?” She peeked over his shoulder then started walking.

He didn’t try to physically stop her because he was all but rooted to the floor. The way she jumped from topic to topic, one so bone-shatteringly painful and one that had him all but dropping his pants right there. “Hailey, wait...I...”

“What?” She spun around and faced him. All the tension and stiffness had drained away, giving way to something that looked suspiciously like excitement.

“We should go out to dinner and talk about the property. Keep that wall between what we want from each other and what we want to do to each other.” He had some thought in his mind about what normal people did and dinner sounded about right. Never mind that he could barely move his legs and his erection threatened to rip his zipper apart.

As soon as he thought it, her gaze dipped. Traveled right down his body. “Well, now. That looks impressive.”

Much more of that heated look and he’d take her on the fucking floor. “Did you hear me?”

She took her shirt off. Untucked it from her jeans and slipped it over her head. Stood there in a bra that was more lace than material. The damn thing was near see-through and he knew that because he could not stop staring through it to her bare skin.

She held out her hand to him. “Sawyer?”

Jesus.
“Are you sure?” He wanted more than anything for her to be sure. He would do just about anything for her to be sure.

“I made the move. This is my decision.”

It took all the control he had not to pounce on her. “You understand what I want from you, right? Strip you down, spread your legs and fuck you until neither of us can breathe.”

Her skin flushed. “Stop talking and show me.”

The guy almost bolted across the room to get to her and Hailey couldn’t think of anything more flattering. She’d been with other men. Wanted other men. This was different. Like a craving. It wound her up and freaked her out a bit, but then his hands touched her waist and nothing else mattered.

His mouth landed on hers. Not teasing and not gentle. No, this was deep and hot. It dragged her under and sapped her of any doubts. She didn’t even know she was moving until her back hit something solid. Then he was all over her. His fingers slid through hers as he trapped her wrists and pinned her arms against the wall.

His kisses burned through her and the room began to spin. Every time she shifted her body brushed against his and the friction stole her breath. But being held down, at the mercy of his mouth and the pressing of his erection against her, lit a fire inside her. She wanted him on the bed and inside her and showing her what he meant when he promised to fuck her.

He stretched her arms higher as his mouth moved down her neck. With tiny nibbling kisses he’d bite her then lick the spot. He kept going until his mouth settled on the top of her breasts where they overflowed her skimpy bra. His tongue skimmed along the edge of the material while excitement spun inside her.

With his nose, he pushed aside the material as his mouth dipped lower. Then his lips touched her nipple and her back arched off the wall.

“Sawyer, please.” Her voice sound so rough and husky as it echoed through the quiet room that she almost didn’t recognize it.

“Oh, I’m going to please you.” He let go of her hands to peel down her bra. His tongue slipped from one nipple to the other, licking and sucking. “Make you so wet.”